Emma Roth is a journalist who covers the streaming battles, consumer technology, crypto, social media and more. She was a writer at MUO.
Meta’s AI chatbot is coming to Europe almost a year after it was paused in the region. Meta AI is rolling out this week in 41 European countries, 21 overseas territories, and on Facebook, Instagram and Messenger. For now, it will only be available for text-based chat. Meta AI launched in 2023 in the US. Meta initially planned to bring its assistant to Europe but was forced to pause their rollout after Ireland’s privacy watchdog requested that they delay training for content posted by Facebook or Instagram users. It also halted its multimodal Llama AI in the European Union because of regulatory concerns.
Meta’s AI assistant is currently only available to users in Europe. It can be used to help with brainstorming ideas, planning a trip or answering specific questions by using information found on the internet. Meta AI will also allow European users to surface specific content on their Instagram feed. They can’t, however, use the tool to generate or edit images, or ask questions about a picture. The model was not trained using EU user data. Meta spokesperson Ellie Heatrick told the Vergethat the model is only available in the region and has not been trained using data from EU users. “We will continue working collaboratively with regulators to ensure that people in Europe are properly served by Meta AI innovations that are available to the rest the world,” said Meta spokesperson Ellie Heatrick. Meta doesn’t appear to be giving up on its plans to add more features to the European Meta AI version. The company says that it will “find parity with US and expand our offerings over time.”
